New England Valkyries

New Spring Classes Start This Week!

A new 5-week Beginners class is starting on SUNDAY March 4th. This the perfect opportunity to kick off your boots and give vaulting a go. The class is at 2:30 pm at our barn in Groton and runs about 75-90 minutes. Please email us at info@newenglandvalkyries.org to reserve your spot. The price for the five sessions is $200. Pretty sweet!

Also advanced vaulting begins at 3:30 (we overlap our conditioning time with teh other class). This is an 8 week session. You can sign up for all 8 weeks for a discount—just ask. Or, if you want to be a "drop in" vaulter, please let Rachel now.

Pico is going really well! So it's going to be a great spring.

A New Summertime "Introduction To Vaulting" Series

Now's the time to sign up for summer vaulting! Come learn the compulsory exercises, free-style moves, and team routines.

We are offering a weekly intro class on the barrel to teach you what you need to know to get onto the horse quickly starting in mid-August. Adults, teens and children are welcome--depending on who signs up we may offer several sessions.

Our introductory barrel class is perfect for first-timers and for those who may have been away from vaulting for a while. It will get you ready to vault on the horse safely—and give you quite a workout!

Please email us ASAP if you are interested. Classes filling quickly!  info@newenglandvalkyries.org

New Vaulting Dates for July

If you are interested in trying vaulting, check out the July calendar dates we have just added. We'd love to have you come out and observe or try vaulting for yourself.

A Beautiful Essay on Vaulting, on Practice, on Change...on Life

In  1956, EB White, best known, perhaps, as the author of Charlotte's Web, wrote an essay called "The Ring of Time,"  in which he reflects on the nature of time while watching a circus vaulter practicing in the ring.  The essay is often excerpted and excerpts usually only contain the section on the vaulter, but it's worth reading the whole essay.) White is entranced by the vaulter, by the very idea of her practice and its relationship to performance, and this gives him a place to begin talking about the nature of change over time. In the second section of the essay—this is the part that is left out of most anthologies—White reflects on time spent in the southern states  just after the Supreme Court's Brown v. Board of Education decision and the changes he was anticipating for  society.

The vaulter's practice is a metaphor for White. The vaulter creates the illusion of time running in circles, of beginning where she ends so that "the two were the same, and one thing ran into the next and time went around and around and got nowhere." The illusion is that time never passes and the world will never change. And yet, it is a practice—and in every practice the goal is always change and improvement.  Even in a circle, there is  forward momentum.

Vaulting Practice!

Here are NEV vaulters practicing compulsories. Click on any of these images to see a larger version--or click on the photo album link on the right to view more of this practice.